Jeopardy! is a battle of contestants matching their knowledge; sometimes it’s a battle of celebrities matching their knowledge (with significantly easier questions); and sometimes it’s the best of the best of the show matching their unlimited knowledge!
Now, for the first time ever in Jeopardy! history, it’s a battle of hosts matching their ratings.
When producers focused on who would be the permanent host to take over for the late great Alex Trebek, both Ken Jennings and Mayim Bialik seemed to be frontrunners to be named permanent host, since they were both equally well-received during their respective tenures as guest host.
When we did an article at the time here at We Got This Covered to determine who would be named the permanent host, we suggested the producers would likely choose both Ken Jennings and Mayim Bailik, which seemed to be an odd prediction at the time, but — not to toot our own horn — obviously proved to be completely accurate.
Now they have both been hosting for a year, and although they aren’t actually competing against each other, it’s almost certain that if one of them clearly has higher ratings, then producers might be thinking about that host being given more of the duties while they perhaps edge the other host out.
Vulture spoke to Jeopardy! executive producer Michael Davies about the show, and considering ratings are not necessarily differentiated by the hosts, and streaming services have changed how ratings are handled, they asked Davies which host is leading in the ratings.
Davies answered, “One of the biggest things is the ratings of the show. When Ken is hosting and Mayim is hosting, there’s zero difference.“
He didn’t stop there, however. He added that, because of social media, ratings are only one way to learn what fans like. He noted the producers’ observations on social media as he explained, “In terms of the tiny percentage of our audience that go on Reddit or Twitter, there are Ken fans and there are Mayim fans, There are people that love Jeopardy! and will watch both. We also have various fans who post that they don’t like either of them. That’s just part of the data we look at.”
Davies added that neither host seems to be more favored over the other, regardless of what the barometer is, or what observations they make. Pointing out that some fans don’t like either of them is humorously honest, and he noted in the interview that he wished some fans would be more kind with their feedback and stated, “The show is so hard to host.”
He concluded, “I go to the studio every day and try to make both of them better at hosting the show and make a better program environment around them. They have my full support.”
It seems clear that both Ken and Mayim will keep going as the permanent hosts, likely for as long as both of them desire.